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ST. GEORGE -- A St. George man is trying to solve a mystery. He found a camera that had washed up on the shore of Southern California, and he wants to find the family that owned it. He posted some of the footage on YouTube hoping someone would recognize them.
While on vacation over spring break, Jeremiah Wilson found the camera buried in the sand about two miles away from Crystal Cove State Park near Laguna Beach, California. Upon first glance, this camera was thrashed.
"Looking at it, it didn't look like the thing was going to work," Wilson said. It's been there, rolling around in the ocean for two and a half months. I found it in the sand. I just didn't assume it was going to work."
But, sure enough, it did.
"I was excited when I opened it up, plugged it in and saw these kids shooting guns. I thought, ‘This is pretty cool.'"
The camera is a GoPro, equipped with a strap so someone can fix it to their head while recording. Hours and hours of footage were captured on this camera, 17 clips in all. The last clip reportedly happened Dec. 23 at Crystal Cove. Wilson recognizes the Beachcomber Café in the background. The family seems to be having a great time - right up until the camera falls into the Pacific Ocean.
"When he lost it, when it comes off of his head in the water, it rolled around in the ocean filming for two hours," Wilson said. That's where I took a few clips out and posted the ones where the fish would float by." The footage also shows the family skeet shooting and fly-fishing in what looks like Central Oregon. People who have seen the video he posted tell him they wish they could go on the vacations the mystery family seems to have taken.
"It gives me a feel for the family, anyway, which is, I think the most fascinating part," Wilson said.
The family in the video seems to have two teenage boys with possibly some younger siblings or cousins. You can see the faces of the boys and what could be their grandfathers pretty clearly. Plus, a girl called "Izzy" is named in it.
Wilson says he's saved all of the footage from the camera on the Cloud and Picasa, so he'll be able to send the family links to the raw video. He'll even send them the thrashed camera.
In the age of Facebook, Twitter and other forms of social media, he's optimistic he'll be able to find the mystery family.
